


Made of Star Stuff

by dancinbutterfly



Series: Cosmic Love [1]
Category: Political Animals, The Martian (2015), The Martian - All Media Types, The Martian - Andy Weir
Genre: Boys Kissing, Crossover, Crossover Pairings, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, Flirting, Holding Hands, M/M, Pizza, Sexy Times, Space Pick Up Lines, Washington Parties, Yuleporn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-19
Updated: 2015-12-19
Packaged: 2018-05-07 14:07:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,916
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5459207
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dancinbutterfly/pseuds/dancinbutterfly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“And that actually works for you?”</p><p>“Usually.” Watney winks and TJ can tell that he is absolutely full of shit.</p><p>“What’s your fallback when it doesn’t?”</p><p>He holds out his hand to TJ. “Hi. I’m Mark Watney, space pirate.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Made of Star Stuff

**Author's Note:**

  * For [alby_mangroves](https://archiveofourown.org/users/alby_mangroves/gifts).



> Gift Note: My darling Alby, I know you to be a most excellent human so when you said "crossovers are okay" I did my best to find something cool. Behold, the only Political Animals/The Martian crossover in existence. You said you wanted TJ to be happy and I think a guy like Mark could do it. He's funny and smart and strong and open with a big heart. I hope you like it. I'll be honest, I forgot you even wanted the Martian until this fic was halfway finished.You do not want to know how many different people and fandoms I went through before I landed on Mark. Let us say you were this close to seeing him with either Derek Hale: Werewolf Activist and Deadpool: The Merc With a Mouth, and leave it at that :D 
> 
> ~*~*~
> 
> Content note: If you're here for the TJ love and haven't read or seen the Martian - here's all you need to know: Mark Watney was an astronaut who got stuck on Mars for a year and a half. He scienced his way home, nearly getting himself killed a whole bunch. He has a killer sense of humor and hates disco and is generally a good dude.
> 
> If you're here for the Mark love and havent seen Political Animals - here's all you need to know: TJ Hammond is the gay son of a president named Bud Hammond and the former Secretary of State (and at the end of the miniseries) Presidential Candidate Elaine Barrish. He's a twin and was outed at 15 when he lived in the White House. He has a substance abuse problem, plays the piano, loves his family, and is kind of promiscuous back in the day. His ex was a married Republican Senator named Sean Reeves and we in the PA fandom don't particularly like him very much. 
> 
> ~*~*~
> 
> Timeline notes: For the purposes of this story - we're going to pretend that the Ares III mission is taking place around now and that Elaine Barrish will be in her first term as president when the crew returns home with Mark.

_I know that the molecules in my body are traceable to phenomena in the cosmos. That makes me want to grab people in the street and say, “Have you heard this?”_  


— Neil deGrasse Tyson

“Hey handsome, is your father a thief? Because it looks like he must’ve stolen the stars and put them in your eyes.”

TJ rolls said eyes at the man standing in front of him, a glass of something amber dangling from his fingers. Though they haven’t had the pleasure of being formally introduced, TJ knows who he is. Hell the whole world knows who Mark Watney is. He was Time's Person of the Year. He and the other Ares III astronauts are the reason the White House is having this party. TJ just can’t actually believe that he used a space-themed pick-up line. There’s no way a self-respecting astronaut would ever actually do that. Would they? “I’m pretty sure you know who my father is.”

“Pretty sure everyone knows who your father is,” Watney agrees with a warm smile. “But it’s a good line all the same.”

TJ shakes his head. “It’s really not.”

“Sure it is. I back it up with something like ‘you’re out of this world’ and underthings have been known to just drop as if the gravity’s doubled. It’s kind of amazing.”

“And that actually works for you?”

“Usually.” Watney winks and TJ can tell that he is absolutely full of shit.

“What’s your fallback when it doesn’t?”

He holds out his hand to TJ. “Hi. I’m Mark Watney, space pirate.”

TJ takes his hand and shakes it, his eyebrow quirking. “Space pirate?”

“In the most literal sense of the term,” Watney agrees. “I participated in pirate activities in space. Ergo,” he waves a hand at himself. “Space pirate. Shiny?”

TJ laughs. He can’t help himself. “Do you reference Firefly to everyone you try to pick up, too?”

“No. That was a test.” Watney beams at him. “Congratulations, you passed.”

“Oh well in that case, I’m honored.”

“You should be. So, can this space pirate buy you a drink, matey?”

“It’s an open bar,” TJ says, feeling compelled to point it out. Watney is just begging to be teased, acting the way is. "And you already have a drink."

“Ginger ale." Watney holds his drink up so that TJ can see the tiny bubbles. "Having a drink gives you something to do when people are talking at you that doesn't involve actually listening. Besides, I was thinking somewhere else,” he adds, “somewhere I would have to pay, where there are fewer cameras. Because I’ve been hitting on you for the last couple minutes, in case you missed that.”

"I didn't," TJ replies with smile as he glances around the reception hall. There’s a band playing at the far end. Formally dressed people fill every inch of space. It’s like any of the hundreds of galas he’s been to over the years, only at this particular party one of the guests of honor is trying to get him to sneak them both out early.

This whole little shindig was put together by his mother to honor the latest funding endowment from Congress to NASA. Mark Watney’s safe return from space six months prior had precipitated the increase and now he and the rest of the Ares III team were here to rub elbows with the D.C. elite, showing gratitude for their continued employment by posing for pictures with an added bit of groveling.

"Awesome. Now in the words of all the silver screen greats: let's get outta here." 

“This party is about you. I’m pretty sure you’ll be missed. Trust me, you do not want to be on the wrong end of a secret service detail.” Ah, his misspent youth. 

Watney waves a hand dismissively. “I’ve already made the rounds. Besides it’s nearly midnight; I’ll turn into a pumpkin if I don’t get out of here soon.”

“And if I told you I didn’t drink?” Because he doesn’t drink anymore. Not in fifteen months. Not one pill, powder or drop. His blue one-year chip is in his pocket right now, solid and comforting — almost like a magnet holding him to this wall, away from the wet bar.

The news doesn’t seem to slow Mark down at all. “Then I’d say let's go get a pizza or something because the hoity-toity crap they’re serving is not real food. Listen,” he says, leaning forward a little, “I haven’t done this in awhile, what with being literally off the planet for about three years and all, so it’s kinda hard for me to tell if you’re playing hard to get or if you’re saying no. So I just want to put it out there that I like to think of myself as being a gentleman, and I can absolutely take rejection, honest, but you haven’t actually done that yet. Said no, I mean. You haven’t said yes either though, and if there’s a chance you could still say yes, then I’ll keep going with my wooing thing, but if not, just say so. I really can take a hint, believe it or not.”

TJ can’t resist the smile that tugs at his lips. He fights it, even goes so far as to lift his hand to cover it as nonchalantly as he can manage with his thumb, like he’s scratching an itch, but dammit, he’s charmed. He’s been surrounded by charismatic people his whole life and it takes a lot to wiggle under his defenses yet here he is, utterly fucking charmed. 

“I’m not saying no.”

Mark Watney has amazing eyes that shine when he smiles. He doesn’t hold anything back at all. It makes TJ’s breath catch at the sight and he knows that whatever else Mark (because with a smile like that, TJ just can’t keep thinking of him as something as detached as _Watney_ ) asks of him tonight, he is going to say yes.

“So, what's the verdict on getting out of here?”

“I know you’ve been out of the news loop for a while but I really don’t drink.” He pulls his chip out of his pocket and holds it up for Mark to see. “I’m in recovery. Still interested?”

Mark shrugs. “I have severe PTSD from being stranded on Mars. If you can handle the possibility of me having a flashback, I can handle you needing to stay dry. So. Pizza or burgers?”

TJ glances around for his jacket. It was hanging on the back of a chair, thankfully between them and the door. “Pizza. I know a place.”

“Do we need to ditch your tail?” Mark asks, jerking his thumb at one of the many suited Secret Service agents milling around the ballroom.

“There’s no point,” he tells Mark as he fishes his phone out of his pocket to text his head of security, letting the man know that he was en route and where to. It was easier than being chased down or tracked via the GPS in his phone like they’d done back when he had been fifteen. He still has a few faded scars from sneaking out of fancy buildings into the D.C. night and into clubs he was far too young to be in. “They know all my favorite places.”

“Hey, it’s your town.”

“That it is,” TJ agrees, though he’s never really thought of the city that way. But Mark is right. D.C. is his town. He’s lived here longer than anywhere else — knows the way it moves and breathes and bites. There’s a certain safety in that, no matter how cutthroat life can be living in the shadow of the Hill. 

When they get down to the street TJ presents Mark with their options. “It’s about a thirty minute walk. Or we can get an Uber.”

“No,” Mark says with a small smile. He glances up at the covering of trees that line the front of the reception hall. “Walking is good. I like being outside.”

“Yeah? I was never huge into nature. I mean, I like that it’s nice out but, I was always more of a reader. And I played piano.” He smiles a little. “I played piano _a lot_. I was kind of a music nerd.”

“Plant dork. Music nerd. If you’re interested in something enthusiastically, people are going to call you names for it. It just means you’ve got passion in you.” Mark grins and turns around to walk backwards so he can meet TJ face-to-face as they talk. “Passion’s good. We need it to live.”

“Otherwise we’re just existing right?”

“No. Otherwise we’re dead.”

TJ tilts his head. Mark, for all his humor, is clearly not joking about this. 

It wasn’t that TJ hadn’t followed Mark’s marooning when it was happening. He had a phone and a television and a computer, so he got updates on the story like everyone else on the planet. It was simply that he hadn't felt compelled to follow the media storm that surrounded Mark once he got home. The circus that built around him had been too familiar and TJ hadn’t wanted to be a contributing factor in the capitalization of someone else's trauma. So he didn’t watch any of the commentary or the interviews Mark gave, beyond the first live report from the Hermes, choosing to end his spectatorship after it was reported that Mark was safely back with his crew. 

He’d been briefed on more of the details before the event tonight. So as of now, he knows that Mark was on Mars for something like a year and a half, give or take; that he’d been injured and/or in extreme danger at times, from all the various hazards that came with living on a planet that was essentially uninhabitable; that he’d been starving for some of it; and, most importantly, that he’d been alone for all of it. TJ just didn’t know any of the specifics.

He’d spent the better part of that year white-knuckling his sobriety and readjusting to being a First Son again. He’d been pulling his life back together one scrap at a time when he hadn’t been dragged around the country as a show-pony to help his mother get elected. 

TJ never thought about what being completely, utterly alone for a year would be like. He’d spent most of his life trying find a way just one minute’s worth of solitude. Looking at this handsome, smiling man, he thinks he wouldn’t have liked it. He thinks that it would have cost him something — probably more than it cost Mark, who despite everything seems to be more whole than TJ has ever managed to be. 

“You know, I’m not a rocket scientist,” TJ says.

“That’s okay. I think I can cover the rocket science for both of us, should it come up.” He trips over an uneven patch of sidewalk and quickly course-corrects without falling. It’s impressive. “Do you think rocket science is going to come up at this pizza place?”

“No, I just mean, why me? I don’t know that we have all that much in common.”

Mark’s eyes crinkle. “You look like the kind of person who actually listens, not just waits their turn to talk.”

“I wasn’t always,” TJ admits. “I learned that in recovery. A lot of sitting and listening and learning how not to just wait for your turn to talk.”

“Recovery, huh?”

“Yeah.”

“Can I ask what you’re recovering from?”

“I keep forgetting that you have literally been on another planet and actually don’t know all my twisty tabloid drama,” TJ teases and then stops, his face falling because wow, that was probably in bad taste.

Mark just laughs. “I know right? I don’t even know who won the Superbowl.” He winks. “That’s a lie. I watched the Seahawks choke on youtube when I got back, but seriously — It’s okay. It’s nice. Most people dance around it or talk about nothing but the mission, like that’s all I am — Mars Guy.”

“That’s a shitty superhero name.”

“I know right? Mars Guy. With the power of dustiness and things going wrong, constantly.” He smiles, shyly for the first time. “But yeah, I mean, I’ve got issues with it, but it’s okay. It’s not off the table.”

“That’d be kind of like me telling you you couldn’t mention my parents were presidents, huh?”

“A little bit,” Mark agrees. “Only not really because those are your parents, not you, and I’m not taking your mom out for pizza. I’m taking you.”

“Good point. And it’s cocaine, mostly. What I’m in recovery from. Cocaine. Mostly. Alcohol too.”

“Rough.”

“Yeah. It’s been over a year though, so, I guess I’m winning.”

“Every day above ground is a win with something like that.” 

“It is.” TJ finds himself agreeing. He remembers a time when he very much didn’t, when his depression was at a place where he wanted to die, and later at a point where he didn’t want to die so much as was tired of being alive. This is better. It’s fucking great actually, outside in the cool air with a handsome, interesting man who keeps smiling at him like he means it. He wonders if Mark knows about his suicide attempts and decides that he doesn’t care. It’s not that important right now anyway. “Recovery was all I had time for, for awhile there, but I’m getting back to other things now. Its nice, to do something besides try to get through the day.”

“Amen to that,” Mark agrees. “I’m technically living with my parents in Chicago again, until I figure out exactly what I’m going to do with myself, which is just so sexy for a guy in his forties to admit.”

“Hey, I technically live at home,” TJ commiserates.

“Yes, but your ‘at home’ is the White House. Not even a house that is white, but the actual White House. It’s a little different.”

“It’s really not,” TJ counters. “There’s still a mom who wants to know where you’re going at night and you still can’t bring anyone back for sex. Times, like, a thousand, because the Press Secretary will have to include it the briefing the next morning.” He can feel his face go hot because hey, maybe just maybe he just accidentally admitted to wanting to bring Mark back for sex.

Mark’s grin goes a little wolfish. “Well it’s a good thing I have a hotel room then, isn’t it?”

Yeah. TJ’s face is burning now, which is crazy. He used to have sex with strangers all the time in the most inopportune situations without a second thought. Of course, the keyword there is _used to_.

“But we’re still getting that pizza,” Mark says, charging on as if there hadn’t been an awkward pause in the conversation. “I want you to know that the fact that I’m a sure thing does not nullify the pizza. The two are not mutually exclusive.”

TJ chuckles and shakes his head. “Pizza’s pretty important to you huh?”

“I can honestly say I dreamed about it more than once when I was on Mars.”

"Good thing they deliver." TJ stops and looks around. He spots a black sedan a hundred feet back and waves his arm in the air. The lights flash once and TJ sighs. He waves again and the car rolls forward until it comes to a stop in front of them. 

The window rolls down revealing Agent Murphy, a woman in her early fifties with her hair pulled back in a tight bun, still dressed the evening gown she’d been wearing for the event. "Can I help you, TJ?" she asks gently, not at all put out. Murphy's been on his detail on and off since TJ was a kid. She had pulled him from the grips of more than her fair share of potential scandals in the past fifteen years.

"Can we get a ride, Murph?"

"Change of plans?" she asks, completely nonjudgemental, forehead flat, lips pulled to the side in a gentle curve.

"Slightly," he agrees. "So you got room in the back for a pair of losers like us?”

“Of course. Give Diaz the address and we’ll get you there.”

TJ tilts his head at Mark, questioning. Mark grins. “The Hays-Adams?”

“Nice.” Gentleman that he is, he opens the sedan’s back door and holds it open for Mark to hop inside first before he following him in. “Good to know we’re still putting people up in style.”

“I’m the Mars Guy, Mr. Hammond,” Mark says. “They can’t have people knowing that I’m accustomed to such luxuries as sleeping in the back of a van.”

“You don’t really seem like the type.”

Mark snorts as the car drifts out of park and towards Pennsylvania Avenue. “Please, I’m a botanist. In college all my classmates were potheads. Even before Mars, I was familiar with the back of vans whether I wanted to be or not.” He grumps. “Stupid group projects.”

“Not a team player?”

“I’m a huge team player. I’m just a not a team player with people who want to invent the next super-strain of THC-heavy and fungus-resistant cannabis.”

“I think I hooked up with a few of those in high school.”

Mark snorts. “I guess there’s no accounting for taste.”

“I’m here with you aren’t I?” TJ points out as downtown D.C. rolls past their windows. “My taste’s improved some.”

Mark reaches over and covers TJ’s hand with his own where it rests on the seat between them. “It’s pretty arrogant of me to say it has but, yes, it totally has.”

His palm is warm and rough, calloused and scarred. It feels good. It sends heat shooting up TJ’s arm. He hasn’t felt a touch this electric since Sean. This is better though, because what he’s feeling with Mark is honest. Open. _Free_. He turns his hand so he can lace their fingers together. 

In the rearview mirror, TJ catches Murphy’s eye and sees her smile.

~*~*~

_The beauty of a living thing is not the atoms that go into it but the way those atoms are put together._  


— Carl Sagan

Somehow they manage to make it all the way inside of Mark’s room before they’re on each other. TJ backs Mark into the door not long after it slams shut. He’s solid in a lean sort of way, moreso even than TJ himself is. TJ's not a little guy by any means, but he’s not exactly built either. It’s not often that TJ is the bigger guy in an encounter.

TJ likes it. He can sort of move Mark around as he pleases, kiss his way downwards into a warm willing mouth and find himself met by gentle, firm hands on his lower back and the nape of his neck. He can feel Mark’s callouses when he slips one of them under the waist of his tuxedo pants and past the elastic of his boxers. 

He moans into Mark’s mouth. Mark chuckles back into his. Of course he does, because of course Mark is the type to laugh during sex, to think of sex as something fun. TJ relishes it. There’s been a noticeable absence of laughter in his life for a long time. He’s ready to let it back in.

“Bed?” Mark gasps when they pull back to breathe. “Because this is great but, my back hasn’t been the same since, yeah. So — bed?”

“God, yes.”

Mark pulls away and actually jumps onto the bed like a kid, kicking his shoes across the room even as the mattress bounces him up a little ways from the force of his landing. They hit the opposite wall with loud, successive thuds. Then he yanks off his socks and hurls them in the general direction of where his shoes landed and wiggles his eyebrows in TJ’s. “Do I need to do the come-hither finger wiggle?”

“Just don’t ask me if I know how to whistle,” TJ says as he toes off his own shoes. They’re Italian leather, his favorite pair that he's had for ages. They also cost more than he’s honestly earned in the last two years playing piano gigs in hotel lobbies and department stores okay? He doesn’t want to scuff them — sue him. His socks then follow suit, and after that he’s finally free to jump into bed after Mark. 

They tear at each other’s clothes like teenagers, giggling and catching sloppy kisses in-between focused attempts to undo buttons and pull down zippers. TJ used to be much better at this. He used to be able to strip naked at warp speed. This feels different. This almost a game but one that’s far from being a race. It’s more like tag, or a hide-and-seek of exposed skin, with unspoken rules being enforced with kitten licks and teasing bites. 

“God.” Mark groans as TJ maps his bared chest with his hands once they’re finally naked. There’s a puncture scar on the side of his stomach, then lines of cuts and burns all over. TJ is careful with his touches and Mark shivers. “I forgot. How did I forget?”

“What’s that?” TJ asks, sliding his palms up and over Mark’s shoulders, then down his back before settling to hold him around the waist.

“Being touched like this,” Mark says around a gasp. “I forgot what it was like to be touched like this.” He gives TJ a thin smile. “You go long enough alone and you forget what it feels like.” He reaches out and cups TJ’s right cheek with his left hand for a moment. After a beat he then trails his fingers down TJ’s jaw, over the side of his neck, finally coming to rest on the protrusion of his collarbone. “To have skin against your skin.”

“How’s it hold up?” 

TJ sits back on his heels and starts to pull away, but Mark catches his wrist. 

“TJ.” Mark breathes in deeply before surging forward to kiss him again, brief and hot, just pulling far enough back so that he can speak, their lips still brushing. “Just keep your hands on me.”

“I can do that.” 

Mark’s kisses are determined and methodical, yet still somehow desperate. There’s a hunger in them that TJ submits himself to gladly. He tastes a little like the hors d'oeuvres and the champagne that had been passed around the gala but mostly he just tastes like himself and it’s good — god, it’s fucking great. TJ wants to climb into him, but what he actually ends up doing is pushing Mark down into the bed.

He’s shorter than TJ by a couple inches, and all that means is that they fit together perfectly, solidly, as TJ rolls them until he has them both where he wants them. Usually, TJ's the one who ends up bent over the nearest flat surface or laid out across a mattress but Mark had mentioned that he had back issues and means TJ will need to improvise. TJ’s so keyed up that his mind starts racing for alternatives to compensate. The idea of riding Mark crashes through him like a tidal wave, taking his body exactly the way TJ wants at his own speed and force, grinding down onto his cock until he can taste Mark in the back of his throat.

“Do you wanna fuck me?” TJ asks. He’s so hard that he feels like he’s going to die if they don’t do something soon. Mark is hard too, and TJ's a fan of frottage and everything, but it’s just not really doing the job for him right now, not when the prospect of having Mark inside him is so close.

“I — yeah. Yeah, that sounds good.”

“Do you have stuff?”

“Stuff?” Mark’s eyes cross for a moment and then his eyebrows shoot up. “Oh. Yes. Yes. Of course. Lube. And condoms. I have, um, stuff.” He flushes, pink starting at his ears and rapidly spreading across his face and then rushing down chest. “Hope springs eternal, you know?"

"I do. Where are they?"

"They’re in my suitcase.” 

He goes to sit up but TJ shoves him down with a hand on his shoulder, pinning him to the mattress. “No. Stay.”

Mark grins up at him. “Bossy.”

“I prefer the term goal-oriented.”

“No it’s cool,” he drags his hands up the length of of TJ’s spine, then back down, giving his butt a quick squeeze before dropping his hands back down to the bed. “I’m good at taking orders.”

That makes TJ snort as he rolls out of bed. “I’m sorry but I remember a couple of things from when you were on Mars, not a whole lot, sure but a few, and I find that insanely hard to believe.”

“But your orders are so much more fun than NASA’s,” Mark counters. TJ has to admit, even if it’s only to himself, that it’s a good point. 

"Where is it?" Out of the corner of his eye, TJ sees him push up onto his elbows so that he can one-handedly grab a pillow. TJ catches him shove it beneath his back then turn to watch TJ as he ferret fruitlessly through the main compartment of Mark's suitcase. 

“Smallest outer pocket of the main section. Sorry.” Mark grins, not looking sorry at all. "I was enjoying the view."

The zippers give easily and then there’s paydirt. There’s a strip of four condoms and a small bottle of lube hidden away beside a tube of toothpaste and an electric razor. TJ throws both onto the bed and clambers back on top of Mark. He likes the view from up there.

“Hand me the lube?” he asks, going up on his knees to straddle Mark’s narrow hips. 

“Sir, yes, sir,” Mark replies, eyes twinkling in the low bedroom light.

“Oh, is that how you want to play it?”

“We can,” Mark says agreeably, handing over the bottle. “I’m just happy to be off the bench.”

TJ looks at it. “Astroglide, huh? Not a KY guy?”

“I’m an astronaut. Like I would use any other brand?” His grin his a little smug and TJ laughs so hard that he spills it all over his hand when he tries to pour what he intended to be a small amount. Mark actually has to catch his hip to keep him from toppling over. His grip is solid and TJ is ready to feel those hands really hold on to him. 

He drops the condom strip on Mark’s chest as he reaches between his legs to lube his entrance. “Suit up, space boy.”

“Yes, sir.” Mark actually does a little salute before tearing open the packet with careful hands.

It makes TJ laugh again but, actually, yeah, the sir thing actually is doing it for him. He messed around a little with BDSM when was younger, the harder stuff back when he was looking for _everything_ to be hard, but never like this. He was never in the one in command, and it certainly was never anything that even came close to resembling playful. It was all serious, rules and regulations and pain and performance. This is different. Mark is different.

Mark is also hard, covered neatly with a condom, and just begging to be ridden. TJ bites his lower lip as he slicks himself up quickly and jerks his fingers out of himself, wiping them on the bedspread before planting both palms on Mark’s chest, leaving sticky handprints on his skin.

“Hold it steady for me,” TJ grits out and Mark does, gripping the base of his cock and staring up into TJ’s face as he sinks onto him. TJ means to go slow but as soon as the fat head works it’s way in, he gives himself over to gravity’s mercy. His body swallows Mark’s whole length in one go and their moans come out of them in a chorus.

“Holy fuck, you’re so tight. Jesus, TJ, I can’t think.”

“No one’s asking you to. Just —“ TJ catches his teeth on his lower lip as Mark rolls his hips up. 

"TJ, fuck."

"Should you be doing that? With your back?" TJ manages to grate out around the blinding onslaught of sensation. 

"Yeah it's good. It's fine. I'm great. Fuck. You feel amazing." 

He rolls his hips upwards again and TJ nearly chokes on his tongue. “Ngh. Yeah. That. Do that.”

“Okay.”

“Okay?”

Mark laughs and it shakes his whole body, which means it shakes TJ’s body and oh god, that’s good too. He can feel it all the way to the base of his spine. 

“Yes, sir.”

TJ leans over and kisses him, quick and dirty. Then he grinds down on Mark as hard as he can. It makes Mark shout wordlessly and throw his head back, arching his strong neck. TJ bites the long column and hums. “You’re damn right.”

Mark’s hands catch his hips and suddenly it’s like they’ve been doing this for years. Their rhythm might as well be set to music, something with a thunderous bass track like the techno beats he loved dancing to in his younger, wilder days, the kind that never fails to set TJ’s heart pounding faster, has him desperate to catch up to the pace of Mark’s cock moving inside him. 

Sensation hits him deep and hard, dragging slick across nerves and filling up empty places he’s ignored for years, maybe his whole life. He scrambles, pushing back into Mark’s thrusts for more, digging in with his fingernails on Mark’s chest, and Mark meets him head on, not challenging just — solid. Mark is solid. Mark's grip his firm and strong on his thighs when TJ arches his back to change the angle, Mark bends his knees up to give TJ something to work against.

Neither of them is going to last like this. It’s been too long for the both of them. Mark’s mouth is open, full lips panting hot and wet as TJ grabs for his neck, pulling him. “C’mere,” he gasps, rocking even as he tugs because he needs to taste Mark again before he comes. He has to. 

He gets another of those big Mark-smiles and Mark’s immediate compliance as well. They’re sitting face to face now, and TJ winds both of his arms around Mark’s neck so that he can kiss him. It’s almost too intimate, locked together like this, Mark’s holding him with both palms flat on his back, their breaths intermingled. Almost, but not quite. 

“You close?” Mark asks, mouthing across TJ’s jaw. “Because I’m so fucking close. I’m dying, TJ.”

“Yeah. I need- Fuck, Mark. Mark, I need—“ TJ’s brain isn’t working. It feels too good, hard fullness inside him, warm, sweaty skin around him. Thank god he doesn’t need to finish his thoughts because Mark gets it. He’s clearly good at puzzling out solutions because his fist is around TJ’s cock a not even a full second later, keeping time with the movement of their hips.

“Come on,” Mark coaxes, hand moving fast and slick with TJ’s own precome. “Jesus, you’re so fucking gorgeous. I bet you look even better when you come. I wanna see, TJ, please.”

TJ has no idea why it’s the “please” that gets to him. Maybe it’s a lifetime of people demanding shit from him, maybe it’s tied into the “sir” thing, and maybe it’s just how hot Mark sounded as he said it. Whatever it is, it has him coming all over Mark’s stomach, arms tightening around Mark’s neck, fingers digging where they’d been hooked around his own forearms. 

Whatever he might’ve yelled in orgasm is cut off by Mark kissing him as TJ clenches around him, coming himself. He thrusts up hard three or four more times, TJ is too out of his mind to keep track, and then by the time he comes back to himself, they’re both breathless, boneless lumps that used to be men.

Mark tilts his head and kisses TJ’s temple, following the motion up with a small, contented sigh. TJ makes a low humming noise in agreement as they carefully untangle themselves from each other and dispose of the condom. 

They flop back down, Mark’s head pillowed on TJ’s stomach, TJ sprawled like a starfish with his head on the pillows. He’s still a little dazed when Mark turns his head to face him and says “So hey, about that pizza.”

~*~*~

_We could be in the middle of an intergalactic conversation and we wouldn't even know._  


— Michio Kaku

“The look on his face.” Mark giggles around a mouth full of hot pizza. TJ grins back around his own bite.

The delivery guy obviously hadn’t been expecting a very naked First Son with the most famous astronaut since Neil Armstrong curled around him from behind to be the ones who opened the door when he’d come knocking. His eyes had almost popped out their sockets from the shock of it. TJ tipped him a fifty before he shut the door in the kid’s face. The last thing either of them needed was something like that ending up on Instagram. 

As it stood, there wasn't much stopping him from Tweeting what he saw if he wanted. It would be a PR nightmare but there a million things worse that could happen than the world knowing he spent the night with Mark. TJ would know. He'd lived at least half of them.

“You'd think a pizza boy in this town would have seen everything.”

“You were wearing a towel,” Mark points out. “So it's not everything. Pass me a pop will you?”

TJ reaches over the side of the bed and snatches up one of the cans delivered with the pizza. He holds it up, displaying the label. “I’m sorry did you mean a Coke?”

“Who are you, the language police? A rep for the Coca-Cola company?” Mark makes grabby hands with his greasy fingers. “I worked hard tonight. I’m a thirsty man.”

TJ nearly hands it over, only pulling it out of reach once before handing it over. “I seem to remember doing all the work.”

“I’ll be having that orgasm back then, thanks.”

“Oh well in that case.” They grin at each other and Mark pokes him in the side with his toe. “What?”

“Want to go out with me?”

“Mark, we already fucked.” He gives Mark’s ankle a squeeze with his clean hand. “Mission accomplished.”

“Yeah, but I mean like, to a museum or something. You know. Like, an actual date.” 

“You want to date me?”

“I want to go on a date with you. You do that so you can find out if you want to be dating someone generally and, besides, we are in D.C. The Smithsonian is, like, right here. That’s eighteen museums here in town and I bet I could get us into any of the research centers with my sad ‘I was stuck on Mars like Robinson Carusoe’ story. Other scientists eat that shit up.”

“I’ve been.”

“To all eighteen?”

“It’s nineteen. You’re forgetting to count the zoo.”

Mark snaps his fingers. “Right. The zoo. I bet the zoo is awesome.”

“I haven’t been since I was, Jesus, what? Thirteen maybe?” It had been for an event, but he and Doug had gotten to pet the lions. Granted, it had been very carefully, under the strict supervision of the zookeeper, and his mother had the biggest shit-fit when she saw the footage on the news that night, but all things considered, it had been pretty great. 

“I was always more of a botanical gardens kind of guy, but I do love me a good zoo. And I do mean a _good_ zoo, the ones that are all about conservation and education. I bet the Smithsonian’s zoo is fantastic. So.” He gives TJ another gentle poke with his toe. Or rather he tries, since TJ’s got his ankle held captive. “Zoo tomorrow?”

TJ studies him. He’s happy and bright, but he’s not kidding. Mark actually wants to go on a proper date with him. TJ literally cannot remember the last time a man wanted to spend time with him that hadn’t involved them being naked or that wasn’t centered around dancing, drugs, and alcohol. Even with Sean, it had been about how quickly they could get out of their clothes.

“Don’t you have things to do?”

“Nope.” Mark says, popping the P. “ And what I might have, I can blow off. See, I met this really great guy and I want to take him out. What about you?”

“I…I was going to work a little?” 

“On what?”

TJ drops his slice of pizza back into the box and tries his best not to blush. It’s going to sound stupid. He knows it is. Mark is a fucking scientist. He is technically a doctor. He’s been to Mars and back. Compared to that, what TJ is does is nothing. “Uh, music? I write sometimes. I’ve been working on a couple pieces for a few months.”

“Oh man really? That’s so cool.” Mark scoots closer. “What kind of music do you write?” He holds up his hand, pizza and all. “Please, don’t say disco.”

“I don’t think anyone writes disco anymore.”

“And it’s a better world for it,” Mark says on a meaningful exhale. “So is it like garage band stuff or are you too classy for leather pants and a mesh tank-top?”

“I wouldn’t say that,” TJ hedges. There are pictures of him online wearing that exact outfit actually. With varying colors of mesh, usually with the face of whoever he wound up fucking that night pixelated out. “I, uh, I still play piano.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. Classical piano mostly, but I can play anything you put in front of me and pretty much anything by ear. But, um, I like to write classical pieces.” He can feel his mouth curl upward even as he says it. He can’t help it. It just feels so good to be making music again. It's been a huge part of his recovery and an even bigger part of his independence, even if he is still living with his mom. He's building something separate from their political legacy, something that's just his and he’s proud of himself for doing so. “It’s never going to be on Top 40 lists or anything like that.”

“It doesn’t need to be if you love it,” Mark says. “I mean, do you really think it’s cool to go into botany? I was no chick magnet.”

“How about a dick magnet?” TJ teases.

Mark gives him a shove. “Some of us didn’t really explore the less hetero aspects of our sexualities until we were safely in grad school. But no. It didn’t drive boys crazy either but I love it. And you so clearly love it.”

He drops his head back against the headboard and sighs. “Fuck, I really do.”

“So? That makes it awesome.” 

“My mom wanted me to be a concert pianist.”

“What did you want to be?”

“Not the president’s kid.” TJ admits. “That is as far I ever got. I started realizing in my twenties that it wasn’t something that I could ever escape from, so I sort of imploded a few times. Now, here I am.”

Mark nods. “Back at the beginning.”

“Basically.”

“Well, I guess we’re at the beginning together, because I never got past ‘astronaut’ on my life-goals list, but you couldn’t make me go back out there now. Not for a billion dollars in a billion years. Which leaves me with, like, now what?”

“Write a book?” TJ offers.

“Kinda already done. I made all these journal entries when I was gone and NASA is releasing all the logs so I can publish it.” He takes a long drink of his Coke and sets it on the floor before continuing. “People wanted me to put it out before I even got home. Not doing one at all never seemed like an option that I had. This is probably the easiest way to do without…rehashing everything.” He tosses his own half eaten slice into the now mostly-empty box. “I guess it’ll give me something to live off of and it gets them a lot of PR. Doesn’t really leave me with much of an actual job to do but, yeah.” He shrugs and looks down at his work-worn hands. “A book.”

“Huh.” TJ frowns. “I guess I have to go to the zoo with you then, don’t I?”

Mark’s face lights up. “Why’s that?”

“Can’t leave you on your own with nothing to do, can I? That’d be cruel of me.”

“Not because you want to or anything,” Mark says, moving again, up into TJ’s space this time. TJ’s is suddenly very aware of how naked they both still are, of how soft Mark’s mouth is.

“Of course it isn’t.”

“Or because you like me.” Mark kisses him, slow and sweet, with open lips and a gentle tongue. 

“Definitely not.” TJ gasps.

Mark gives him another, much briefer kiss. “This is just another humanitarian effort for good old Mark Watney.”

“Yeah.” TJ agrees, burying his hand in Mark’s hair and pulling him in for a kiss of his own this time. “It doesn’t hurt that I do though.”

“Do what?”

“Like you.”

“Oh.” This gets him another of those gorgeous mega-watt Mark-smiles. He’s starting to feel like he could become a collector of them. “Good because I like you too.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to S for the beta and thanks to N, K, and KD for the emotional support. You guys were heroes. <3
> 
> Title is a part of quote from Carl Sagan that goes: "Some part of our being knows this is where we came from. We long to return. And we can. Because the cosmos is also within us. We're made of star-stuff. We are a way for the cosmos to know itself." 
> 
> All the quotes used are from scientists who work with space in one capacity or another. All of them are cool as hell, not to mention brilliant.


End file.
